Think Progress calls out President Obama and his Pot bullshit [View all]

[Ichingcarpenter]

Even after President Obama’s recent comments that marijuana is not less dangerous than alcohol and that the state legalization measures are an “important move,” he declined to comment Friday on whether he believed the federal government should reclassify the drug from its current status as a dangerous substance with no accepted medical value, and said such a change certainly won’t come from his office.



When asked during an interview with CNN’s Jake Tapper whether he would consider changing marijuana’s designation as a Schedule I narcotic, Obama said making that decision is a “job for Congress.” And when Tapper pointed out that the Drug Enforcement Administration has the power to reschedule drugs, Obama said, “It’s – it’s not – it’s not something by ourselves that we start changing. No, there are laws under – undergirding those determinations… ”
In a tweet Wednesday, a spokesman for the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy said the attorney general can change the drug’s designation, but that it is “not likely given current science.”

Tapper later asked whether Obama would support a change in the schedule. Obama didn’t respond directly, but cited scientific research in saying, “But the broader point, I stand by my belief, based, I think, on the scientific evidence, that marijuana, for casual users, individual users, is subject to abuse, just like alcohol is and should be treated as a public health problem and challenge.”

The current scheme for classifying controlled substances does not treat marijuana anything like alcohol. While marijuana is listed as Schedule I, the most restrictive of the five designations under the Controlled Substances Act, alcohol and tobacco are not on the schedule at all. Highly addictive and potent drugs, meanwhile, including cocaine, opium poppy, morphine, and codeine, are listed as Schedule II, designated for those drugs that have a high potential for abuse and dependence, but which have “a currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States or a currently accepted medical use with severe restrictions.” The synthetic version of THC, known as dronabinol, is listed as Schedule III, even though THC is the ingredient in cannabis that causes psychoactive effects.



http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2014/01/31/3232871/obama-wont-executive-action-marijuana-supports-public-health-approach/